Yep, we headed to Taman Negara, Sungai Relau AGAIN.

Having just been there two weeks ago, it's a fair trek to go back, but the place is so amazing and this long weekend proved no different.

So how can we get 3.5 lifers?

OK, lifer number 1) Large Frogmouth. It's HUGE. As the name implies, we were thinking he would be a little bit bigger than perhaps the Javan Frogmouth, which we are familiar with, but this chap was enormous, more in-line with a good sized owl. What a beauty! No photos though.

Lifer number 2) Yellow-crowned Barbet.  We've been listening to this chap ever since we started birding. Locating his whereabouts is quite tough as they're normally waaaay up in the tallest trees, and until now, we've never seen them anywhere visible amongst the treetops, but on this trip, I noticed a bird perched just 20 metres off the ground...trrrrrroook....took..took..took..took..trrrrroook..took..took..etc..  Looked through the bins and noticed the reddish fore-crown and yellow-crown, also a relatively plain blue throat. COOL! Finally, we got him.   Poor photo. He may have only been 20m off the ground, but the tree was still a long way off. 

Lifer number 3) Crestless Fireback.  We had sat down in the road to have a sandwich and simply watch perhaps 8 different species of bulbul go bananas amongst some fruiting trees when Jas looked up the road, coincidentally at the same time a male appeared at the verge, he then walked across the road as we got an eye-full through our bins.  Gorgeous looking bird, and so pleased to have the male. He didn't walk so fast, so we managed to get a really good look.  Shortly afterwards, he was followed by a single female.

And here comes lifer number 3.5) Several years ago, we'd seen the juvenile Black-and-White Bulbul, and this trip gave us great views of a male, female and juvenile all in the same tree. We've always looked for this bird when at Sungai Relau, but it had avoided us until now.  So, the half-tick is to get the adult.

The birding was great besides getting 3.5 lifers. Other not-so-commnly sighted birds such as the Asian Green Broadbill;

This guy was together with a female and another male, maybe getting a bit frisky given the time of year.

Another chap we haven't seen for a fair while was the Finsch's Bulbul;

Another time we had sat quietly on the road to eat/drink, we had a female Malayan Peacock-pheasant pass across the road, so she's now added to the year list.

Plenty of mammal activity too. Here is the full list of (IUCN LC/NT Status) mammal's seen in Sungai Relau.

Here is the full list of birds we've seen at Sungai Relau. To view individual trip reports, just click the trip-dates within the left menu.

So, after this trip, our year-list scores are:

John: 238

Jasmine: 235

Together with Seng & Carol, we kick-started the official 2010 Raptor counting at Tanjung Tuan near Port Dickson.

A grueling first day, with a lot of humidity in the air across the straits of Melacca causing difficult with the visibility, and a burning sun giving temperatures of 35°C+.

The Oriental Honey-buzzards made a slow start to the day but as the afternoon progressed, we had clocked up over 3,000 by 3pm!

Using a double-barreled Kowa scope, it made life a bit easier with counting the more distant raptors, some of which were mere blips on the horizon.

What a great start to Raptor Watch 2010! 

I did get a few moments to fire of some shots as they came through, but as it was afternoon, most of them are so badly back-lit it's a waste of time photographing them unless they can get behind the lighthouse where the light is better.

Check out this poor chap. Imagine, you've got at least 3,000 miles (5,000km) to reach your final destination, and your tails fallen off!

Oh Bugger!

And this female came in and circled around us for a while. She was clearly knackered (exhausted), just letting her feet hang loose, and gasping for air. Good on yer girl! The worst is over.

While there are so many different morphs to the Oriental Honey-buzzard (OHB), the following image represents a pretty good 'standard' morph that we see come through, being the male of the species, with the grey head, and fat terminal tail band;

OK, besides the OHB's, we also saw plenty of Changeable Hawk-eagles, a lone Grey-faced Buzzard, White-bellied Sea-eagles and a couple of Chinese Goshawks.

Here is today's bird list, which puts the year-list scores at:

John: 221

Jasmine: 220

Here's wishing all of the volunteers for this year's Raptor counting a success, and good luck to you all.

First of all, Gong Xi Fa Cai.

We decided to spend the 4-day weekend by joining the masses in their migration out of Kuala Lumpur, but instead of heading to a family home for the festivities, we headed straight for Taman Negara, Sungai Relau, Merapoh.  At least for the start of our trip.

Having arrived at lunch time, perhaps not the optimum time for starting a birding session, nevertheless, we parked up and set up the gear. While doing so, I noticed a Hornbill in a fruiting tree, just sat there quietly in the shade.

It was an immature Rhinoceros Hornbill.  He sat for a while, then jumped around a few branches and carefully plucked figs from the branches. Lovely start to the day.

I also added a gallery shot in of the Hornbill for a larger image, click the thumbnail below;

Moments later, still in the car park, we were watching Crested Serpent-eagles soaring, and a pair of Grey-headed Fish-eagles too!

As I have said before, Taman Negara is more of a 'birding for the blind' kind of trip, as the calls make up more of the bird list than the sightings.

The list however was pretty good for just a few hours, considering the time of day.  

I managed to capture an image of the Little Spiderhunter, my first, in rather a nice setting, feeding on this flower:

Here is the complete list of birds seen on that afternoon.

We didn't stay in Merapoh as the chalet's, dorms and camp site were chock full of students, so we included another destination into our itinerary, and by 4pm we were on our way up to Taman Negara, Kuala Koh in the state of Kelantan.

We have never really been impressed with Kelantan from an 'environmental' point of view as we've witnessed swathes of rainforest, whether primary or secondary, being reduced to bare soil in preparation for Oil Palm plantations, and this trip was no different.

To reach Taman Negara, Kuala Koh, you have to drive through Gua Musang (logging capital of Kelantan), and then on through miles of Oil Palm plantation.

Along the way we saw 'them' giving climate change the middle finger in several places.

So, after a pretty depressing and infuriating drive through this nonsense, we arrived at the 'island' of Taman Negara, Kuala Koh.

The chalets at Kuala Koh were also fully booked, so we had to settle for dorms, and this would constitute our romantic Valentine weekend away

Many of the visitors were either there for the fishing (didn't think you could do that in Tmn Negara), or just to be there.

As for Jas and I, we were the only ones who ventured across the river into the park and onto the trails.  As with Merapoh, you really need to know the calls of the birds, as you are inundated with them from so many species.  It was a refresher for us, hearing calls that we clearly should know which species it belongs to, and finally figuring them out after shaking up the brain cells.

I lugged the 500mm in for the first day, but figured, what a waste of time, and the next, I took in the 100mm Macro. Much better.

Besides the birding, we were able to see plenty of mammals too, including Wild Boar (we spooked it, and he spooked us back), Lesser Mouse-deer, Giant Squirrels and perhaps the biggest kick to the nuts, was a close encounter with a Malayan Tapir.

How close?

We didn't see it, but we heard a noise from behind us while we were being spooked by the wild boar, and when heading back along the trail, just 50-100m away, we noticed fresh tracks in a muddy area we had recently passed. 

Some prints had just 3 big toes, while others had 4. Strange. When we got back, we checked the mammal book and found that sure enough, the Tapir has 4 toes on the front and 3 on the hind.

ARGHHH!! WE MISSED THE TAPIR!

Here is the full list of mammals we saw in Kuala Koh for the weekend (only those with IUCN Status of LC or NT will be shown).

Here is the full list of birds we saw, likewise, our location reports at 'place' level will only ever show LC or NT status species.

So let's get down to some bug shots, seeing as though not many bird shots to report from Kuala Koh.

Here is a Cicada which has recently crawled out from under the ground and will soon hatch into the noisy little buggers that try to whack you when walking under a fluorescent lamp on your way to the dorm.

Here is a small fly and is standing on a very fine mist of spider web.  He's not stuck to it as we saw him fly around and return to the same spot. Not quite sure what he's trying to achieve by standing on the web, maybe he likes the cushy feeling?

This dragonfly had electric-blue patterns in it's wings. Quite amazing when the sun strikes it.

And here's a closer look at his ugly mug;

While walking along the trails, we were never-ending wiping cobwebs out of our faces, and not just strands that spread across the path, but sometimes the whole web!  So many different spiders around, and perhaps one of the weirder ones is this;

Here is a mosquito hanging onto the edge of a leaf

And just outside the door to our dorm, we had this flying Gecko waiting for a photograph.

So that was Kuala Koh in a nutshell. Loads of birds, loads of calls, plenty of insects and mammals, and generally, a nice place to visit. The trails were good, but a bit poorly marked in places, a bit of trash along the way, but we've seen worse.

We left Monday lunch and headed out through the Oil Palm vistas back to Pahang for some late afternoon/evening birding at Taman Negara, Sungai Relau (Merapoh).

It was quite late by the time we arrived, about 6pm, but still managed to clock up a decent list of birds, starting off with a pair of Black Hornbills in a fig tree at the car park. Cool!

We got a sighting of the Bat Hawk at dusk in search of...well....bats, and three Malaysian Eared-nightjars came out at last light which was a bonus.

So, Tuesday morning was to be our last day at Sungai Relau and what a day it was! With a bird list of around 50 species, not bad for a morning effort and lugging the 500mm along the road paid off too. 

Managed to get an ok shot of the Stripe-throated Bulbul who was also going mad in the fig tree, but fortunately stopped for a moment's photo shoot.

Managed to get a shot or two of the Orange-bellied Woodpecker. We heard a pair of them nearby and finally caught a glimpse of them amongst the trunks deep inside a tree, not good for photography, and as luck would have it, the female flew out into a fairly bare tree for a few seconds, long enough to fire off a few shots. Here's the 'sighting' shot, followed by a thumbnail linking you to a larger 'gallery' shot.

Another beauty was the buzzing calls of the Crested Jay, and another bird I've struggled to photograph over the years, and finally, an almost decent shot, although a leaf was obstructing the line of sight with the tip of the crest. Beggars can't be choosers!

And then came along a pair of Scarlet-rumped Trogons, male and female.

We even had a pair of Wrinkled Hornbills fly over, but not enough clear sky to get a shot. Great to see them again, as we've only seen them in three places so far.

As time was pressing on, we had to head back to the car, but before packing the kit away, this Black Giant Squirrel was busy eating a Palm nut.

And in true spirit of a long weekend, how else to finish it off, with a long slow crawl back to KL with millions of others. 

6h30m from Merapoh back to our home!

A great trip, and Sungai Relau never fails to impress.

Here's the total bird list for Sungai Relau (once you're there, click on the trip dates for individual reports if you're interested).

And the mammals list.

So let's take a look at the scores.

Our year list for birds sighted in Malaysia now stand at:

John: 217 (Woohoo)

Jasmine: 216

But if we look at the list including the 'heard', we have the following;

John: 244

Jasmine: 245 (how?)